During my time I had some very difficult years, and I had very pronounced competition, all by men.

Ada Yonath

I used ribosomes from very, very robust bacteria under very, very active conditions and found a way - I actually took advantage of research done before me at the Weizmann, the same institute I am now - how to preserve their activity and their integrity while they crystallized.

Ada Yonath

People always talk about the implication and applications of a process, but for me, the goal is purely about knowledge. Knowledge can become practical today, in 20 years, or in 500 years. Ask Newton. He didn't know there would be space research based on his accident with the apple.

Ada Yonath

Anyone who sits in our jails who is not just a criminal but what we call a terrorist, with or without blood on his hands - and these definitions are also unclear to me - should not be sitting in our custody.

Ada Yonath

At the end of the 1970s, I was a young researcher at the Weizmann Institute with an ambitious plan to shed light on one of the major outstanding questions concerning living cells: the process of protein biosynthesis.

Ada Yonath

Many ribosomes act simultaneously along the mRNA, forming superstructures called polysomes.

Ada Yonath

I wanted to reveal how genetic code is translated into protein. I knew a great application could be for antibiotics, since half of the useful ones target the ribosomes, but I didn't believe I could contribute to it. It was like the next Mount Everest to conquer. It was my dream to contribute something to humanity.

Ada Yonath

Waiting for me in Stockholm will be a personal assistant - Katrina from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs - as well the secretary of the Swedish Academy. They'll help us with our things and take us to our hotel. From the moment I arrive, I'll always be together with the other two laureates.

Ada Yonath

People are obsessed with my haircut; everyone wants to do something with my hair before the ceremony. Very senior figures tell me their hairstylist wants to do my hair for free. It's surprising. People from television are interested almost exclusively in aspects of my hair and my hairdresser.

Ada Yonath

From the age of 11, I was cleaning floors, washing dishes, making sandwiches and being a cashier. Survival was the name of the game. Life was so hard that I had to struggle to keep up my standards. Under these conditions, I didn't think about science too much.

Ada Yonath

DNA is a code of four letters; proteins are made up of amino acids which come in 20 forms. So the ribosome is a very clever machine that reads one language and operates in another.

Ada Yonath

There are over 7,000 different types of proteins in typical eukaryotic cells; the total number depends on the cell class and function.

Ada Yonath

I was described as a dreamer, a fantasist, even as the village idiot. I didn't care. What I cared about was convincing people to allow me to go on with my work.

Ada Yonath

For quite a while, I didn't receive a higher academic status. I didn't feel any discrimination against me as a woman scientist, but I hadn't produced a lot of science journal articles.

Ada Yonath

When a man sits in our jails for a number of years, and around him friends and family become angry, that is how we create terrorists.

Ada Yonath

I was born in Jerusalem in 1939 to a poor family that shared a rented four-room apartment with two additional families and their children.

Ada Yonath

If one has curiosity, then one stands the chance of attain a high level of scientific inquiry.

Ada Yonath

My kindergarten teacher encouraged me to learn, as did my school headmaster, who gave me a grant to study.

Ada Yonath

Even if I tried to fill up the stadium in Ramat Gan, I don't think I could.

Ada Yonath

I'm truly glad I've managed to get the public interested in questions about basic research.

Ada Yonath

After I spent my compulsory army service in the 'top secret office' of the Medical Forces, where I was fortunate to be exposed to clinical and medical issues, I enrolled to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Ada Yonath

Proteins are constantly being degraded. Therefore, simultaneous production of proteins is required.